Kensington Primary School

Eco-Schools

Eco – Schools is an environment education programme and is managed in England by the environmental charity Keep Britain Tidy, the anti - litter campaign for England. Eco-schools is an international award programme that guides schools on their sustainable journey, providing a simple framework to help make sustainability an integral part of school life. There are 9 key areas of Eco-schools; Energy, Water, Biodiversity, School Grounds, Healthy Living, Transport, Litter, Waste and Global Citizenship.

We were awarded the Bronze and Silver awards in 2017.

Green Flag Award

After 3 years of ECO activity Kensington primary school has been awarded the very prestigious Green Flag! The award is the culmination of years of working together as a team – supporting each other; thinking sustainability at every turn. Well done to everyone in Kensington, the children and our brilliant parents who are always keen to support the school in every way.

Assessors comments:“I was pleased by the commitment shown by the eco-coordinator and the head teacher to the school’s sustainable and environmental aims. I was particularly impressed with how much the school’s sustainability aims have developed from having ‘just a few recycling bins’ to where it is now, in just a few years. Well done to everyone and keep up the great work.”

This award reflects all the hard work and effort everyone has put in over the years!

Eco-warriors

Who we are?

Ms Riaz: Sustainability Leader

Rashmi Makwana: Parent Governor

Year 6 - Irrina, Seneha, Khadija

Year 5 - Monisha

Year 4 - Laiba

Year 3 - Leo, Adam, Rayan R

Year 2 - Khadija, Vaishnavi

Year 1 - Amelia, Zak

What do we do?

At the beginning of the year we carried out an environmental review of our school, which looked at the 9 nine key topics mentioned earlier. The topics that were highlighted were chosen as our focus areas. These can be seen in our action plan.

We meet once every week (see minutes) and focus on one topic to decide at ways to improve our school and discuss any ways we can make our school more eco-friendly, such as: turning lights off when the classrooms are not in use and monitoring any litter on our school yard. We have allocated roles in school which include: emptying the recycling bins, turning off taps and lights and ensuring the computers are shut down.

We take part in campaigns which run across the country such as ‘World car free day’, ‘Switch off energy fortnight’ and our upcoming one which is ‘The Great British spring clean’, these are only a few of the events we take part in.

We have also teamed up with Kensington cares this year and have taken part in helping at our local charity organisation RAMP. Recycle 4 charity is another way we raise money for a children’s charity known as Claire’s House, where you can donate old phones (£70) and used ink cartridges (£1), and all the money will go to children who are severely ill. Please donate to help save the ill children.

What have we done already?

World Car Free Day

We all had a healthy breakfast together at school

Switch Off Energy Fortnight

Our switch off day was testing for some but what a day to remember, all lights, boards and computers were off for the day. We saved 36% of energy on our switch off energy day!

Kensington’s Eco-stalls - Re-love my stuff

A huge thanks to parents and staff for donating clothes for our Eco-stall, we managed to sell them during our summer fair and raised £100 for our charity!

Our Eco-warriors did an amazing job in promoting and launching our stall, thank you to everyone for all your support.

Smoothie bike

Our smoothie bike was a huge success in promoting healthy living. Everyone enjoyed riding the bike and blending their own nutritious fruit smoothies, we raised over £60 pounds!

Eco-afternoon

We held our very first Eco-afternoon which was huge success. Our theme was linked to living things and waste.

Nursery and Reception learnt about what they could recycle and why this is important. They created medals and amazing art pieces using recycled materials. This was led by the Keep Britain Tidy team. In Year 1, children learnt about why we should grow our own fruits and vegetables and planted seeds to sell at the summer fair. In Year 2, children learnt about the importance of recycling and reusing by creating notebooks using recycled paper and card. In Year 3 children were fortunate to have workshops led by the Newham waste team, who provided them with interactive activities that explored ways in which you could reuse waste which resulted in them creating bird feeders. Year 4 and 6 focused on the environmental impact of produce from abroad. This led on to planting fruits and vegetables seeds and learning the key life skills. Overall the afternoon was amazing!!

What are we doing next?

We are planning to create our own compost using waste for our garden, where we will grow fruit and vegetables for our healthy picnic week in the summer. We will also be collaborating with the school council and planning ways in which we can reuse clothes and raise money for charity. In the future, we also aim to develop our wildlife area and begin to look at nature.